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kimherbst · 4 years

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How to become an Illustrator??

A 15 year-old wrote to me, asking how he could become an illustrator/get an illustrator job (literally that one question was the entire email lol) so I wrote an long-winded response. I tried to be as informative and honest as possible so hopefully this might help others? Here we go:

Becoming an illustrator first and foremost starts with drawing. Lots and lots of practice, learning basics like light, color, value, composition, anatomy, and so forth. Learning basics helps to hone in on good designs for strong illustrations later. After getting the basics, you can develop your own illustration style, which will evolve and come naturally, based on your likes and dislikes while creating your artwork. You then build a portfolio of your top few pieces, showcasing it on a website, and then show your work to interested individuals (like emailing art directors at companies, social media etc) to get paid to create artwork for them, or commissions from people that like your art style. Your portfolio can also be used to land you a full-time creative job in book publishing, video games, graphic design, and more. You figure out what you'd like your illustration work to be seen in or used towards. Do you want your work in magazines and newspapers like an editorial illustrator? Or maybe children's books? Or greeting cards? Maybe concept art for video games and film? Your portfolio will be tailored to show the work YOU want to do. That's the super boiled down path!

So where to start:You can either go to an art school, OR, do a combination of online classes if the cost is too high for university, but either choice your make, you want to focus on learning foundational art skills first. I think there are pros and cons to attending art college, and the super high tuition cost these days is definitely a negative - BUT I can't make that decision for anyone, and a lot of the positives for going to college are being around other students, bouncing ideas off of them in-person in classes, and building good relationships among your peers that continue after school. What you get out of college can vary from person to person, and some simply do better by being self-taught and not attending college - it's a personal journey!

Taking classes on your own, or finding some sites to follow along from videos is another great start. You can draw on paper, or use digital drawing programs if you have a wacom pen/tablet and computer, or an iPad/e-tablet (some programs like Clip Studio Paint, or Procreate are more cost effective than buying the entire Adobe Creative Suite!). To start, you can check out some places like:

Ctrl + Paint - https://www.ctrlpaint.com/ - free online video library that touch upon drawing basics, and you can put that knowledge towards your own personal art. Also helpful for diving into digital art programs. Highly recommend!

Schoolism - https://www.schoolism.com/ depending on what you're interested in, you can pick and choose online classes from professionals that work in different creative fields

Baltimore Academy of Illustration - http://www.baltimoreillustration.com/ - After High School, should you still have an interest in an illustration career, there's great online courses available here, even for beginners! These guys can help you develop good concepts and ideas for your work, which goes hand-in-hand with illustration.

Following other illustrators on Social Media like Instagram and Twitter - If you like a particular artist, I'd recommend following them! Illustrators regularly will give insight on their careers, and show their latest works, which can give lots of inspiration and advice for younger artists like yourself Hire An Illustrator - https://www.hireanillustrator.com/i/search/ - since you found me on here, I can assume you were perusing around portfolios! Hire an Illustrator has a ton of people you can follow, and also has some great advice (https://www.hireanillustrator.com/i/blog/c/advice/) when it comes to an Illustration Career

Other resources that can aid in gaining knowledge towards your career is the Graphic Artists' Guild (https://graphicartistsguild.org/) and maybe listening to Illustration podcasts (like https://player.fm/series/the-illustration-department-podcast or https://player.fm/series/the-handsome-frank-illustration-podcast and https://player.fm/series/illustration-hour just to name a tiny amount among many) which interviews professionals and talks about the ins-and-outs.

Overall, to get into illustration, you'll be drawing. A LOT. A big portion of it can be drawing really boring things for learning, and you'll need an immense amount of patience, but as long as you're taking in the information from fundamentals and applying it towards drawing things you love, then you're doing it right! It's also okay to feel frustrated because drawing is hard (you can ask any professional, we'll all say it's always hard, the learning never stops, and you're constantly working on your craft!). It's something that develops over time without instant results, so you're in it for the long-term goals.

Hope this helps someone else! (Obviously I’ve missed a lot but I wasn’t about to write an entire thesis for a reply!)

#illustration #career advice #illustrators

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theillustratorscourt-blog · 7 years

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Applied to agencies!

It’s August 2017! The year is flying by. Summer is coming to an end (the offspring are back in school in like another week, yikes! good thing it’s a 3 minute walk away)

Things I have done on my to-do list:

I have applied to a few agencies. (Woohoo! about 5-6 of the major ones)

I’ve found some work in OR (illustration here and there, but also getting some part time labor work).

I’ve taken on new illustration projects. (Super exciting! My clients are always so nice)

My style index has sort of stagnated in favor or work and doodles but I’ll continue it, don’t worry. I did some character design that’ll be portfolio worthy down the line (that’s the shame about big projects: the work you do may not be able to be posted for a year+)

I’ve begun attempting to be on top of my mental health with self care and medication. Currently seeing a counselor once a week but I never have much faith in that... not that I don’t appreciate taking the time to talk about issues but it’s usually focused on hearing the same things I’m already doing for myself: walking, drinking water, sticking to medication, taking care of yourself by doing de-stressor activities.. At least I feel like I am doing something positive for myself (and my kids). The exhaustion is ever present. Some days i feel like a bear who needs to hibernate but the create days are uplifting and I just think of those on the bad days. I’ll always get back to the good days! I will be honest, I haven't been walking as much lately but the summer heat is to blame, haha.. Maybe brisk winter walks will be better. I’ll certainly have to get used to snow if I’m headed to OR!

I’ve been compiling more ideas for self initiated projects and organizing my reference folders on the desktop. I’d always saved work I liked aimlessly but recently, I've really put the effort into breaking them up into folders like: kids, adults, elderly, anatomy, color/light, environments, outdoors, interiors, objects, clothing, animals, animal-people. It’s been helpful when seeking resource while drawing instead of browsing hundreds of unorganized images.

Food branding and packaging always comes to mind for projects but I’ve also written some children’s books topics to focus on making skeleton manuscripts for or thumbnails for character ideas.

I’ve stacked on a wishlist the art and work related things I’d like to own (besides the major expensive big things...hello imac pro...i see you coming this year *sobs*). This list includes: Anastasiy’s Magic Picker and MixColors (I already have “Derricks Brush box”, which i like, so i don’t really need the Magic Squire Anastasiy offers), along with some subscriptions that i’ve mentioned (SVSLearn, Schoolism...). So yea, I’ll be looking into getting those things. When I eventually figure out next years taxes, it’ll be cool learning what I can deduct. There are a handful of helpful resources out there for taxes for freelancers and freelance illustrators that i’ll probably link in another post entirely. :)

Anastasiy’s photoshop/illustrator plugins (MagicPicker is a better color wheel plugin and Mix Colors is a realistic paint mixing plugin: https://anastasiy.com/panels

Derrick Barth’s “Brush Box” is a lovely brush tool organizer where you can have a favorites list and it’s great (plus endorsed by Kyle T. Webster of Kyle’s Brushes : https://gumroad.com/l/brushbox

I never miss an opportunity to buy and endorse Kyle’s brushes, they're the bees knees: https://www.kylebrush.com/

Well, I don’t feel like I really updated a lot in this but it’s pretty hectic with the “unsure where i’ll be in the next 6 months” thing looming. Still need to create mailers (let’s see how many times i can put that in my posts, lol). By October, i’ll possibly have more news (so expect a post then or before based on the new project i will be undertaking), and i would think definitely more news by end of December. Crossing my fingers of creating a brand new set up for illustration between January and Feb! Cant wait to get my cintiq out of storage.. stay sane fellow freelancers!

Sincerely,

An illustrator

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Helpful Resources and LINKS:

The visible women and visibleNB tags online (twitter, instagram, tumblr) are lovely!! Lots of inspirational people’s art to oggle.

I’ve been continuing to listen to Will Terry’s webinars, which are a fantastic wealth of knowledge (SVSLearn is about to raise its prices so i’m scrambling to see if there’s any hope since it’s my birthday month, of getting an annual subscription before that happens). The webinars are free when they’re live so if you register, they’ll remind you and you can watch and listen in the moment but then they go into the SVSLearn archive that can be accessed with a subscription (all are worth watching).

Speaking of webinars, I discovered this utter gem on the Graphics Artists Guild website (absolutely chocked full of info on being a creative professional, copyrights, publishing, illustrating) : https://graphicartistsguild.org/tools_resources/ask-a-pro

and the KNKL show has its concept art boot camp going right now (always a fun, helpful watch for digital artists) : https://www.youtube.com/user/KienanLafferty/videos

Giuseppe Castellano, I follow on all media, as he’s an amazing resource. This entry particularly about SCBWI, was great: http://www.gcastellano.com/arttips/on-scbwi

((and this video about his article condenses the major point if you're more visual by Jesse Engle (She’s a good follow too): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_AK1507zSsk ))

#illustration #kidlit #kidlitart #blogging #motherhood

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dontdropthedoughnut · 4 years

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youtube

27 February 2020 - Laura Price's thoughts on a question I've had on my mind for a couple of months now; Should I go to art school to get a job in the animation industry?

So when I started with the goal that I wanted to be a visual developer for feature length animated films (and I mean really had that goal in mind after quitting my old job in sales and planning that I wanted a career in the art industry rather than doing it as a hobby), I had the mentality of I've already got so much debt from having completed an undergraduate course in illustration, I don't want to ever do another course again (in any subject). Also in terms of mentality and productivity wise I struggled a lot during my university years as I went into it with the wrong mindset; I didn't actually go for the learning and developing but more along with the flow since it was the direction a lot of my high school friends were taking and it seemed like a good experience to have. This lead to me not taking advantage of the actual opportunity I had for skill learning and development and many regrets looking back now.

So to avoid this again I was quite adamant that I can self teach the skills and knowledge I need and do the practise to develop. After all, literally all the information and resources I need can be found online or if needed through books (that I can purchase quite cheaply through Amazon or eBay).

But then as I've been reading up on interviews and blogs from establish and very experienced artists in the industry, I see that a lot of them have had the formal art school training in animation. A lot of the artists who's shows I think are amazing have gone to prestigious universities such as CalArts. At the same time as well, lots of developing artists with amazing styles who I follow on Instagram all seem to be students in their first or second year in art school like Art Centre, Scad or Ringling (these top art schools in the animation prime location). On blogs when they discuss their experience in these art institutions it seems like the knowledge they're being taught, the software they get to practise using, mandatory assignments to be completed and networking opportunities available at end of year shows is pretty integral for success into stepping into the industry.

So now my mind is a little turned...I'm wondering yes I can teach myself from the information I can gain from searching the internet and books, but is my progress severely stunted going down this route? Could the progress I make in one year, in two years, in five years have been doubled if I had done a course provided by an art institution with all they experience they have?

This video popping up from Laura Price, who is an established visual developer having worked for Disney in big name animations gives me some insight. For me it's very useful and reassuring to hear from her in particular because she hasn't had any formal education in animation. She studied a different course and developed her artwork on the side so it's good to hear the opinions from someone who hasn't had the typical experience.

For sure I'd recommend watching the video, it's a short one only being 8 minutes long. The main thing is if you're also unsure about whether to pay for a university course, maybe her insights can help give some food for thought.

For me I think for now I will continue with the self imposed learning but I do want to save up and sign up for Bobby Chiu's Schoolism membership. This is definitely not what I advise what everyone else does but I think a little structure and guiding from experts can help give me more direction and more effective skill development because I do feel more and more I'm just floating.

#doughnut #Don'tDropTheDoughnut #donut #DonutDropTheDonut #art talk #art mindset #artist spotlight #Laura Price #wondering if I should do more formal education #I think another part of me that is so against formal education is the whole I'll be set back again #I know that's just conflicting #because I'd be doing it to progress and move forward in skills #but time wise I'd feel like I'm moving backwards because there'll be all these young high school graduates who are 18-20 starting in #their first time at uni and just speeding forward straight towards that art career #because I wasted 2 years doing sales and I'm very conscious that I've been at my current job that is also non-art related for almost another #two years and I am very very conscious about wasted time #other concerns I have are location and money #the top art schools to go to to crack into the animation industry are mainly in the west coast of America #close to where the actual industry professionals work #if I were to do a formal course in animation I wouldn't want to go elsewhere #just want to aim for what is considered the best by the industry #and because I live outside the US I imagine the tuition fee as an international student would be immense compared to the already expensive #tuition I hear people living in the US seem to have to pay #and US tuition debt sounds scary compared to my current university loan debts that have limits in place which makes not so urgent #also to have to move all the way to another county about 8 hours away by plane seems scary #anyways I'm glad that Laura made this video since it does give a little reassurance that you don't need the formal education to make it #and to be honest all I really want is this reassurance because the likelihood that I will ever go to one of these art school is very low #I do know though that the most important factor though is your personal commitment to developing skills and improving #and my process towards that is 100% very spotty and needing more discipline at the moment #defintiely much more practise that I am currently doing needed to even catch up with the current wave of fresh faced students

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